Union fury over Rinehart move to import workers

UNIONS have issued a blunt warning to Prime Minister Julia Gillard that she must intervene in a decision to let mining magnate Gina Rinehart import 1700 overseas workers for a massive iron ore project in the Pilbara.

One of Ms Gillard's Labor colleagues has declared himself ''gobsmacked'' by the decision, vowing that he and others will raise it in caucus on Tuesday.

The issue also has potential to cause friction within cabinet after it was reported that the Prime Minister had not been given advance notice of the deal, and that she had indicated concern to union leaders yesterday. But supporters of Immigration Minister Chris Bowen insisted that Ms Gillard's office had been kept fully informed of the negotiations.

In a week when hundreds of manufacturing jobs were lost, Labor yesterday approved its first ''Enterprise Migration Agreement'' for workers on Hancock Prospecting's $7 billion-plus Roy Hill iron ore mine in Western Australia.

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The new agreements, devised by the federal government to ease chronic worker shortages in the resources sector, are only available for $2 billion-plus projects with a workforce beyond 1500.

Mrs Rinehart, named the world's richest woman this week by BRW, has long campaigned for more foreign workers to be allowed into Australia.

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The Roy Hill project will employ 6700 local workers during its three-year construction phase, while the agreement will allow 1715 additional overseas workers.

The ACTU and heads of three unions who met the Prime Minister in Canberra yesterday branded the decision ''sheer lunacy''. They demanded Ms Gillard intervene to ensure no job that could have gone to an Australian went to a foreigner.

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ACTU secretary Dave Oliver said Ms Gillard must put measures in place to ensure local workers were not overlooked on big mining projects.

Miners such as Mrs Rinehart were not interested in creating long-term, secure jobs, he said, but only wanted to ''fatten their profits at the expense of the Australian community and workers''.

Australian Workers Union head Paul Howes questioned why Labor had bothered with attacks on billionaires, only to give Mrs Rinehart an ''early Christmas present''. ''I thought we were actually attacking these guys at the moment,'' he said. ''Whose side are we on?''

Labor Senator Doug Cameron also said yesterday's announcement might be good economics for the multi-billionaires in the mining industry ''but it's very bad politics for the Labor Party''.

''The very week when workers are being given their marching orders out of a job at Kurri Kurri [aluminium smelter in New South Wales] and Tullamarine, 1700 Chinese workers are given the go-ahead to march into Western Australia,'' he said.

But Mr Bowen said the new agreement would help meet skills shortages in the resources sector. He stressed the government's first priority was jobs for Australian workers but that there was a need for temporary workers on this project. ''There simply aren't enough people in the local workforce to get the job done,'' he said.

The project would only see foreign workers hired when Australians were not available to fill positions, Mr Bowen said. These overseas workers would get the same wages and conditions as Australians.

A spokesman for the Roy Hill project, Adrian Firth, said the government's jobs decision was ''very responsible'' and over 2000 permanent jobs would be created over 20 years once the mine was built.